Should you find yourself in an anxiety-ridden funk like the one *someone* (ahem) has been in as of late, take these specific steps to immediately remedy the situation. Take a road trip. Two cars, three adults, five children aged five and under, 24 hours, 400 miles and many salty snack foods should suffice. Weather: freezing…
Imagine a dark and blustery night, a room cast with shadows. A writer polishes her working manuscript. The publisher has asked to see what she has so far. (Plot Twist). She adds fancy words, changes the formatting, calls on the universe for extra powerful positive thinking. The wind blows like a demon out her office…
Last spring in a fit of earth-loving-passion I bought a summer CSA share. I’d written a story about community supported agriculture for a local magazine and fallen in love with the idea of paying in advance for farm-fresh food. After all, when I was a kid, I wanted to be a farmer. This would be…
This year I found myself neck-deep in my own past. It began with Facebook, which delivered to me everyone I’ve ever known, loved, despised and/or kissed; most recently came a request to write essays about my childhood, which sent me diving into old journals and quickly concluding with a shudder that perhaps the past is…
Captain Daddy is professionally inclined to report on topics of disaster and death. In our early years together I named this litany of unfortunate events the Trauma Tour. Everywhere we went he had a story to tell: car into tree, drug-addled assault, slow and lonely decay. I endured it, sometimes even with affection for the…
I may not have landed my own column or a book deal from blogging yet (my fantasies) but I have accomplished something! I am extremely pleased to announce that thanks to my recent post (Welcome Home, Chester), Chester has found a new home. Sometime this summer, our favorite dead caribou will be moving from my…
For me, one of the most personally significant impacts of the current economic situation is the return of Chester. Chester was a happy caribou living in the northern reaches of Alaska until the mighty hunter Captain Daddy shot him dead seven years ago. Now he is merely a shadow of his former self—or, more specifically,…
Three weeks ago, the local library suffered a bomb scare. When I tried to return my item on-time like the good girl I’ve always been, the whole place was cordoned off with yellow tape. The next morning, after noting in the newspaper that the library had not been destroyed in an epic explosion, I tried…